Secret
by Not2BForgotten
Summary: A quick litte oneshot i wrote last night...enjoy! Don't want to spoil it!


**A/N: This idea hit me after I watched a certain movie…and please remember this is fanfiction so open your minds….also I don't own em, I just luv to whump em.**

Alan sipped his coffee lazily reading the morning paper when Charlie rushed into the kitchen and grabbed a piece of toast. He noticed that Charlie was moving very stiffly, every now and then he would try to hid a wince but being the over protective mother hen of a father he still noticed.

"You okay Charlie? You're moving a little stiff this morning." Charlie put on his best 'innocent' smile for his dad.

"I'm fine, nothin' wrong" his father huffed.

"Jus old age huh?" he huffed again, Charlie just smiled and hobbled his way out to his bike. It didn't go unnoticed by Alan that Charlie winced and was quite obviously gritting his teeth and expression of pain on is face as he pedaled away at half the normal speed for him. It was a very good thing he was leaving early this morning, at the pace he was moving he'd still be cutting it close for being on time to his classes.

**:-:-:-:-:-:**

Charlie biked slower today. His ribs were killing him and he figured he should probably not be riding a bike not matter how slow but, his father had noticed him moving stiffly so there was no escaping it. If he didn't ride his bike like usual then his father would be really suspicious. He wondered if his father had noticed the pronounced limp he'd fought so hard to hide. He didn't want his father to worry, after all, a few more days of taking it easy when his family wasn't watching and he wouldn't even have to try to hide it. He smiled at himself. They had no idea and would never be able to guess. He himself wouldn't have believed it five years ago, but hey, it happened and he liked it, bruised ribs or not, he like it, it was thrilling. They would never guess and that just added to the fun. _And Don said I couldn't keep a secret, ha!_

He went through his day and decided not to bother covering the limp or stiff movements now that he wasn't under the scrutiny of his father. Larry and Amita asked him relentlessly if he was okay and what had happened. He simply smiled genuinely and said that he was fine and nothing had happened. For the most part it was the truth, after all, he really was fine, and nothing worth mentioning had happened, he was just a little sore. His father's concern was confirmed when Don came over.

"Hey buddy, Dad told me to interrogate you and find out what had happened and what was wrong." Charlie snorted a smile on his face. His father was oh so predictable.

"You can tell mother-goose that nothing is wrong and nothing happened." Don looked at him suspiciously. His father hadn't really given him any details, just sent him off on this mission. "Uh huh, whatever you say: Charlie smiled suspiciously. He was tempted to make his brother's ears really burn with a tall tale, but decided against it figuring he would have to tell his brother the truth in the end. To be honest he was enjoying having a secret from his family and watching it rankle them to no end without answers. Even if the secret wasn't really worth being hidden and was harmless.

"So you got a case you need help with?"

"Nope, Dad gave me the perfect excuse to escape the impending doom of paper work. Congratulations, you were the perfect opportunity to put it all on the rest of the team." Charlie grinned at his brother.

"Tell you what, you buy me lunch and I won't tell them you just said that. I'm sure they just love that you shifted all that paper pushing onto them just to run away." Don stared at his brother shocked. If he'd realized his brother was collection ammunition for blackmail he would never have said anything.

"Drat, trapped. You're evil. Where do you want to eat?" Charlie made sure to eat slowly at the restaurant. His brother ate meagerly. This was not his favorite restaurant and he only came because Charlie had ammunition. To both of their surprise, they hardly talked about work at all. Mostly their conversation resided on girls, dating, advice swapping, and a couple of dating horror stories. Over all it was a good day with great brother time.

**:-:-:-:-:-:**

Charlie hobbled up the stairs as quietly as possible. He didn't want to wake his father. It was almost two in the morning. He grabbed a pair of pajamas and crept into the bathroom. He didn't want to wake his father, but he was rank and filthy, he had to have a shower NOW. He turned the water as hot as it could go without scalding his skin and just let it rain down on his aching muscles. It went well tonight but he was sore and exhausted. It had been a good but brutal practice. After an hour he turned off the shower feeling immensely better and clean at last. He toweled his hair and glanced at himself in the mirror, muffling a gasp. An ugly shiny black eye stared back at him. It was impressive.

"They're going to kill me" he whispered to himself. Exhausted he practically crawled into bed. "Well, might as well not fret. Dad will do enough of that for the both of us. It's not like I can hide it this time." The next morning he tried to avoid any sightings by his father, which definitely didn't go unnoticed by him. When he was ready to leave he wore a pair of sunglasses that wrapped around effectively hiding any signs of the black eye that couldn't be blamed on lighting. He thought he was going to make it when he had his hand on the door knob of the front door.

"Charles Eppes, come back here," Charlie froze, that tone stopped him in his tracks every time. He closed his eyes for a moment. _Caught_. He turned towards his father, the biggest ear-to-ear grin ever seen on the face of the earth. His father wasn't fooled.

"Yes father dearest," Alan scowled.

"Don't you 'father dearest' me young man. Take those glasses off this instant." Charlie shook his head defiantly. His father charged for the glasses but Charlie side stepped out of the way before his father could get a finger on them. They continued this little two-step for nearly five minutes before Alan successfully yanked the glasses off his son's face. The gasp reverberated through the house. Charlie gave the 'busted' groan before his father's gasp had made it's appearance.

"Dad, it's nothing really"

"Don't you tell me that impressive shiner is nothing!"

"Stop worrying mother-hen, it's nothing, honest." Charlie ran out the door before his father could argue and pedaled away for dear life, his father shouting his full name after him. He sighed in relief, he'd escaped for now. People stared at him all day during school. He couldn't blame them. It wasn't often a professor arrived at school with a shiner, especially such an impressive shiner. Larry and Amita's reaction was worse than his father, but that was probably because he didn't have anywhere to run when they saw him. Later his brother called him to the office for help with a case. Charlie found Don, Megan and David all in an interrogation room talking.

"Hey Don," he never had a chance to escape before his brother had yanked the glasses away.

"Well that explains what Dad is all hopped up about."

"Cheater" Colby jogged in and elbowed Charlie in the ribs. Charlie failed to suppress a small wince and faint hiss of pain.

"So what'd I miss Wiz Kid? Woa!" He gawked at Charlie's eye. The wince didn't go unnoticed by Don. He cornered his brother and pinned him against the wall, pulling up his shirt to reveal Charlie's torso covered in big black and dark purple bruises. He deftly pushed his brother into a chair, cuffing a hand to the arm of the chair.

"What's all this about?" Charlie demanded. Don looked down on his brother.

"This, is an inquisition and they are the referees." He waved to the team. Megan sat on the table Indian style, David in a chair next to her, Don leaning against the wall facing his brother, and Colby was still gawking at his black eye. Everyone except Colby looked dead serious.

"The Wiz kid wins a fight, or did you lose?" Charlie snickered.

"I won, you should see the other guy." His brother glared at him.

"Alright, what really happened Charlie? You aren't leaving until you explain." Charlie grinned.

"You and Dad's ears are really burning to know are they?" Don rolled his eyes. "Fine, you want to know what's up, come with me tonight, I've got a umm…appointment, it'll explain everything. Drop by the house with whoever is coming around six. You can follow me there." With that Charlie plucked the key to the cuffs out of Colby's pocket and unlocking the cuffs was out of sight. He was laughing as he went. Don stared at his brother like he was a lunatic.

**:-:-:-:-:-:**

Everybody filed into the front row seats confused expressions quite clear. Charlie had pointed out their seats. They were in a large arena with a wooden rail that just barely reached Don's chest in a large rectangle. In the center was a similar rail that sliced down the middle up until about ten feet from the ends of the rectangle. There was a thick layer of dirt on the ground and the whole thing had the freshly rained on, wet soil smell. They all looked at each other for guesses as to what was going on. Charlie had pointed out the seats and disappeared saying only that he had to go get someone and would be back in about ten minutes.

Colby saw Charlie reappear first, though it wasn't hard to see him coming. He came at them fast. He was riding a gigantic, shiny, jet black horse with a thick, crimped mane that reached down past its shoulder, a tail that would touch the ground by several inches easily if it didn't hold the tail so proudly high, it's big black hooves were surrounded in equally crimped as the mane and tail. Charlie wore a mischievous grin like a kid on Christmas. Amita and Megan's eyes popped.

"Surprised?" the ladies were speechless as well as David, Larry and Colby.

"Absolutely. Since when did you ride horses buddy?" Charlie opened his mouth to answer but a trumpet sounded.

"Oh, I gotta go" He loped away still wearing the silly grin. The night was extremely eventful. It turned out that this whole even was a jousting competition. The only reason they knew which knight was Charlie was because they'd seen his horse before the competition began. He was in black armor with a cool looking design of a phoenix across the chest. Don marveled as his brother participated in joust after joust. Don was pretty sure that his father was going to have a heart attack during a couple of the blows Charlie received whilst jousting. By the end of the night they were all in awe. Charlie had won every match. Megan leaned over to Amita and whispered in her ear. She blushed and they both giggled.

"He really is a knight in shining armor."

**A/N: Well what did you think…a little bit of a stretch, but hey this is fiction. Let me know what you thought!**


End file.
